A Report Card on University Performance on Hiring Women Coaches for Women’s Athletic Teams

A new report by the Tucker Center for Research on Girls and Women in Sports at the University of Minnesota examines the status of women as head coaches for women’s athletic teams in seven major conferences in collegiate athletics.

The rankings were based on head coaches of 970 women’s teams at 86 educational institutions that were current members of seven major NCAA Division-I conferences: American Athletic Conference, Atlantic Coast Conference, Big 12, Big East, B1G Ten, Pacific-12, and Southeastern Conference.

Nationwide, women were 41. 5 percent of all head coaches of women’s teams at these 86 colleges and universities. The percentage varied greatly by sport. For example, 95.7 percent of field hockey coaches were women but there were no women head coaches in triathlon or alpine skiing.

Colleges and universities were assigned grades relating to the percentage of all women’s teams who had women as head coaches. Schools where more than 70 percent of women’s teams had a woman as head coach were given a grade of A. For a grade of B, 55-69 percent of teams had to have women as head coaches; for a grade of C, 40-54 percent; and for a grade of D, 25-39 percent. Colleges and universities were women were 24 percent or less of the head coaches of women’s teams received a grade of F.

Only the University of Cincinnati and the University of Central Florida received grades of A. Seventeen colleges and universities received a grade of B. Nine universities received a grade of F. At Syracuse University and West Virginia University, only 9.1 percent of the head coaches of women’s teams were women. An infographic of the grades for all 86 educational institutions can be seen below.